Fun-loving 400m runner Rabah Yousif will continue to rock his trademark T-shaped salute to his daughter and Teesside when the television cameras pan to him on the start lines in Rio.

Yousif regularly competes all around the world and will be almost 6,000 miles from adopted home town Middlesbrough when he takes to the athletics track for GB in the individual and relay events in Brazil.

But thoughts of home are never far from his mind wherever he races and his signature cross-fingered tribute to seven-year-old daughter Taiba and Teesside will be part of his traditional pre-race routine once again at the Olympics.

“It’s such a coincidence because my daughter’s name is Taiba and that’s her first initial,” Yousif said.

“I used to do it for her but it works well for Teesside as well.

“A lot of people ask me about the gesture and what it means but it’s just something that I do naturally, I don’t think too much about it.

“But I do feel at home here on Teesside. I know more or less everybody, and so many people supported me on my journey.

“They didn’t have to, but they did. Teesside is a special place for me and I’m very proud to be from this part of the world, definitely.”

Sudan-born Yousif admits he still has to pinch himself at times when he thinks about how far he has come both on and off the track.

The 29-year-old has lived in England since he was 14, when he claimed asylum after making a break from a World Junior Championships training camp in Sheffield.

“I could never have really imagined being in this position,” he added.

“But I’ve always been a hard worker and I’ve surrounded myself with the right people.”